Linux Mint

Linux Mint takes Ubuntu's package base and rebuilds the experience around a familiar, Windows-like desktop metaphor: a bottom taskbar, a start-menu-style application launcher, and a system tray, all wrapped in the in-house Cinnamon desktop environment. It ships more proprietary media codecs and drivers out of the box than Ubuntu does, so video playback and Wi-Fi/graphics hardware tend to just work immediately after install. Mint deliberately avoids Snap packages by default (preferring Flatpak) and skips Ubuntu's more experimental UI changes, favoring stability and a conservative update cadence instead. It also ships MATE and Xfce editions for lighter hardware, and a separate Debian-based edition (LMDE) that reduces its dependency on Ubuntu entirely.